ALANA NEARLY JUMPED out of Sawyer’s car. The three of them, Sawyer, Alana and Melanie, had eaten a very good dinner at Il Mito on North Avenue, a small, cozy neighborhood restaurant, new to the area since Alana had lived here and indicative of how the restaurant scene in Milwaukee had become more sophisticated in the six years she’d been gone.
However. What should have been a nice, relaxed celebration of her last night was anything but. Melanie had been hyper and spent the evening trying to get Sawyer to flirt with her. Sawyer had been polite to Melanie, but spent the evening trying to get Alana to talk to him. Alana had avoided Sawyer by spending the evening trying to get Melanie to reminisce with her. And so it went, from the excellent salads to the fresh and unusual pasta and pizza dishes, to the deliciously rich desserts. As soon as Sawyer paid the check, the three of them had practically sprinted for the exit and jumped into Sawyer’s Mitsubishi for the silent drive home.
In the humid summer air, Alana opened their back door, aware of Melanie and Sawyer hovering behind her. Thank God she was going to Florida in the morning; she should have showed more backbone and started her trip today. The thought of leaving Milwaukee again hurt and, okay, she’d miss the thrill of Sawyer’s attention, but she couldn’t take much more of this weird triangle. Melanie deserved a guy like Sawyer, was clearly smitten with him, and Alana needed to be out of the way for them to discover if anything could ignite between them.
Inside, she flipped on the kitchen light, tossed her purse on the counter and glanced at her watch. Not late, but with the time difference too late to call Gran and Grandad. She’d left a message earlier telling them she planned to start her drive the next morning, Sunday. A hurricane watch was in effect for Central Florida; Cynthia was expected to land Tuesday morning. Alana should be there in case they hadn’t taken proper precautions and needed her help.
“Any messages?” Melanie hurried to the machine on the counter by the refrigerator. “Yes! One!”
“Maybe Gran and Grandad.” Alana watched Melanie curiously. She sounded awfully excited about a phone message. “Are you expecting a call?”
“More like dreading one.” She put on a big show of rolling her eyes, then whirled around and jabbed the button. “Might as well check.”
Uh-oh. Alana’s alarm bells started ringing. This was classic Melanie man-behavior.
“If that’s ‘dread,’ I’d hate to see ‘eagerness.’” The murmur came just over Alana’s head, private and intimate.
“Hmm.” Alana turned to smile coolly, which didn’t work because Sawyer was standing close, one hand up on the cabinet above her, and with wine from dinner still in her system, it was hard to do or feel anything but…hot. “I’m not sure she’s—”
“It’s Gran.” Clearly disappointed, Melanie turned up the machine and Gran’s quiet voice again filled the kitchen she’d spent so many hours in for so many years.
“…but don’t come down until this storm is over, Alana. We’ll be fine. There’s still a chance the worst will miss us to the north, which will make more of your trip more dangerous. Even if it hits here, we have friends who’ve already helped us secure the house and will drive us to the evacuation shelter at the high school. We aren’t taking any risks and don’t want you to, either, for your sake and because we’ll worry. Love you, girls. Grandad says hi and sends his love, too. Goodbye.”
Melanie deleted the message, frowning at Alana. “What are you going to do? If you leave tomorrow you’ll get there right when Cynthia hits on Tuesday.”
“I’ll have to drive in two days instead of three.”
Melanie nodded, chewing on a fingernail. “That would do it.”
“Two ten-hour days driving by yourself?” Sawyer shook his head. “That’s crazy. Plus there’s plenty of bad weather ahead of the actual landfall.”
“It wouldn’t be that bad.” Melanie was clearly not pleased to be argued with. “And she’d be there to help Gran and Grandad.”
“They already have help.” Sawyer spoke calmly, gesturing to the machine. “Your grandmother said so. Why should Alana put herself in danger?”
“She wouldn’t.” Melanie fisted her hands on her hips. “She’d be safe at the shelter with them.”
“They’ll worry about her driving all that way.”
“Not if they don’t know she’s driving until she shows up.”
“Stop.” Alana covered her ears. The more rational Sawyer sounded, the more shrill Melanie got. “I’ll decide. It’s my neck, and they’re my grandparents.”
“Hey.” Melanie jabbed a thumb into her chest. “They’re mine, too.”
“Melanie, for heaven’s sake, you know what I meant.”
“Okay, okay.” Sawyer backed to the kitchen door, hands up in surrender. “If you two are going to start shrieking, I’m going upstairs. Hate to miss a word, but…”
“Sorry, Sawyer.” Melanie deflated sweetly. “Sorry, Alana.”
“S’okay, Melanie.” Alana rushed to make peace. “We’re all tense about the storm.”
“Yeah, don’t worry about it, Mel.” Sawyer’s cell rang. He fumbled in his jean’s pocket and hauled it out. “Hello…yes…Oh, right. Hi, Debbie.”
Alana peeked at Melanie to see her reaction at the same time Melanie peeked at her. Then both shrugged comically, which made them both cover their mouths to keep from giggling.
“Thanks. Yeah, um, I enjoyed meeting you, too.”
Alana lifted her eyebrows. Melanie mouthed, I’ll bet.
Sawyer rolled his eyes and turned his back on both of them, which started the giggling again. His fault they were listening, because his large and magnificent body was blocking the exit.
“Tomorrow…” His voice dropped. “I’m free then, yes.”
The giggles stopped. Melanie suddenly found her lack of manicure fascinating. Alana examined the floor for traces of dirt. Of course there wasn’t any because she’d cleaned like a maniac all day.
She wasn’t going to be jealous. If Sawyer wanted to go out with this—
Her eyes jerked to his broad back. Wait! Debbie? The woman he’d been trying to pick up at the party? The woman he mistook Alana for that night? In bed?
She was going to be jealous.
“Okay, see you then.” He clicked off the phone and turned, glancing first at Alana, then at Melanie. “Well.”
“Ah.”
“So…”
“I didn’t thank you for dinner, Sawyer.” Melanie launched herself at him for a long hug, ostensibly to prove Debbie had a lower priority than she did. Alana quietly left the room to avoid watching the lingering full-frontal contact and trudged upstairs carrying even more jealousy, which she needed to dump out the window. Melanie, Debbie, Sawyer…She had more important things to do than moon over a man she wouldn’t know much longer. Like decide what to do about her trip.
There was no point staying here any longer. Sawyer was exactly what Melanie needed, and Alana needed to be in Florida to help Gran and Grandad through the hurricane. But to avoid heavy traffic in the Chicago area she couldn’t leave too early, and that would cut down the miles she could cover tomorrow, not a good thing if she planned to make the drive in two days. She didn’t want to arrive too late Monday or, God forbid, have to spend another night on the road and show up only hours ahead of Cynthia.
But wait. She stopped in front of her room door. Another option which would solve traffic and timing problems was to get up after a few hours of sleep and leave tonight. She’d stoke herself up with coffee, get more than halfway to Florida by tomorrow evening, then to Orlando by Monday afternoon, in plenty of time to help prepare for Cynthia and ride out the storm. Leaving silently would ensure no awkward goodbyes with Sawyer. Melanie wouldn’t object. She’d be relieved to be rid of her sister, at least on some level.
The house phone rang. Alana started into Melanie’s room to answer Betty Boop when Melanie’s voice rang clearly all the way from downstairs, too bright and too loud. “Oh! Hi. Um. Wow! Hi. Hang on.”
Footsteps, running upstairs. Melanie, flushed and agitated, giving Alana a distracted and guilty smile as she passed into her bedroom, closing the door firmly, practically in Alana’s face.
Was that the “dreaded” phone call? Alana’s stomach turned sick with instinct. More man trouble? With Sawyer right here under her nose?
Alana shouldn’t jump to conclusions, especially not again so soon. Melanie said she’d changed. Maybe she really had.
She trudged into her room and packed her bag, feeling sick and hollow. Sick with nagging uncertainly over her sister’s behavior, but also because she was packing to leave Milwaukee again. Before dinner, over drinks at the Firefly Café, they’d run into Lucy Vola, a friend of Alana’s from high school who’d shared Alana’s passion for photography, and who hadn’t sold out to practicality in her career but had a studio on North Avenue with her business-partner boyfriend.
Seeing her and having a lengthy catch-up chat about the business and about mutual friends and acquaintances reminded Alana not only of her disappointed hopes of a career in photography, but also of all the roots she’d put down here, the small-community feeling of Wauwatosa and the larger city. “Small-waukee,” some people called it.
But she supposed it was normal to be anxious about moving. Starting over would be hard anywhere. And she could do better about keeping photography as a hobby once she was in Florida. Somehow she’d let that side of her slip when she moved to Chicago.
She undressed, grumpy and ill at ease, and pulled on her camisole and girl boxers. No sleeping pill tonight, not when she’d be getting up again so soon, which meant she’d sleep badly. Especially if she started thinking—okay, she was already thinking it—about how tomorrow night this would be Sawyer’s room again, and he’d sleep in the bed she was about to climb into. Would he think about her? Every night? For weeks or only a few days? Would Melanie sneak in one night and claim her new territory, replacing their drugged, indistinct memories with vividly erotic new ones?
Probably. And when she did, Alana was going to be the dutiful saintly sister and be happy for her.
She slipped out into the hall and toward the bathroom, doubled back abruptly to get a shirt or other cover-up, then rolled her eyes and turned back again. Sawyer was still downstairs. He wouldn’t—
The bathroom door swung open.
Not downstairs. Here. Tall and masculine, looking her over thoroughly. “What a nice bedtime surprise.”
Oh, God. Alana took a step back, as if distance would make her outfit more conservative, and folded her arms over her chest. “I thought you were downstairs.”
“I’m not.”
Right. Just because she hadn’t heard him clumping up, yelling, “I’m coming up the stairs now, make sure you’re decent,” she assumed the coast was clear? She was definitely not firing on all cylinders. Too much on her mind.
“Need the bathroom?”
She stared at his feet for lack of anywhere else she could bear to look, and tried to gather her exploded wits. “Uh. Yeah. Thanks.”
“How much?”
Her gaze shot up. “What?”
“How much do you need to use it?” His eyes sparked mischief. “What’s it worth to you?”
“Sawyer…”
“Because I think I might charge a small fee to get out of the way. With you looking like that—” he took a step toward her “—I’m not sure I can let you off easily. I might have to—”
Melanie’s door flew open; she burst out, then froze at the sight of her sister in underwear and Sawyer standing very close to her. “Oh. Um. Hi, guys.”
Alana felt her face turn hot. “I’m about to use the bathroom.”
“Well.” Melanie nodded rapidly, her expression strangely distant. “That sounds great.”
Sawyer looked incredulous. “It does?”
It did? “Mel, are you okay?”
“Huh?” Her gaze snapped into focus. “Oh, sure. Yeah, fine.”
“That phone call…?”
“A friend.” She sounded exasperated. “Nothing you need to worry about.”
Alana refused to let the dart hit. “Right. I know. Okay. You just seem a little—”
“I’m fine.”
“Good to hear, Mel.” Sawyer shrugged at Alana and shook his head nearly imperceptibly. “Alana and I were just standing here discussing her need to—”
“Stop.” She pushed past him, and threw a firm “good night” out the door before she closed it.
In the bathroom her eyes were bright and wide, her face flushed. She looked alive, slightly manic, but…pretty. She hadn’t looked like that in a long time. In fact, she’d started to think her bloom of youth was on its way out prematurely.
Not today.
Oh, brother. She really did not need to have this big of a crush on Sawyer. Damn good thing she was leaving, even if it didn’t feel good all the time. At any rate, she wouldn’t see him again, so there was no point thinking about him further. If that was possible.
In five minutes, she’d taken care of her bedtime routine and stepped out again into the hall.
Where Sawyer waited, toothbrush in hand, having changed into sexy soft-looking shorts and a T-shirt which hugged his shoulders, skimmed his chest and fell loose around his waist.
“You’re quick.”
“Oh. Thank you. Or whatever.” She was not going to blush again. Nor was she going to hesitate in the hallway any longer and gaze her fill of him. She was going into her room and closing the door.
C’mon, feet, move.
She managed it, closed the door behind her and breathed a huge sigh of relief. This would be the last time she’d see him. Nothing had changed. She’d sleep, get up, leave a note for Melanie and go. Then she’d call from the road and apologize for leaving without an appropriate farewell. Melanie wouldn’t care. Both of them hated goodbyes anyway, because the ones they’d said to their mother had been so uncertain. When would they see her again? The next day? The day after? Not for a week? Never? So not comforting for little girls to have to wonder.
In bed, as predicted, Alana couldn’t sleep. Every possible worry crawled out of whatever shallow crack had partly concealed it during the day and tormented her. Worry over Melanie, over Gran’s health, tension over the long drive, even worry over all her furniture and belongings being trucked down toward the storm.
And, yes, about Sawyer.
The longer she tossed and turned, the closer the clock crept to the hour she’d decided to get up, the less she realized she’d sleep and the more agitated she became. Honestly.
Finally, she felt her body relax as exhaustion took over. She could survive. Just a few hours of sleep…just a few…
It was time to get up. Her alarm was beeping, but she couldn’t get to it. Couldn’t make herself move. Someone was here in the room with her. Sawyer, taking her picture over and over again, then climbing into bed with her. Why couldn’t she wake up? She hadn’t taken a pill this time. She needed to wake up before his tongue and fingers and hands made her surrender again, before she fell so in love with him that she couldn’t leave at all.
No, Sawyer. Stop.
He didn’t, surrounded her with his body, undressed her, touched her everywhere. He was clothed, then naked, his chest hot against her, his thighs insistently parting her legs.
No, no, no.
He chuckled softly. No means yes when you’re with me.
Then he was inside her, and her body caught fire from the inside out while his stayed cool and solid, urging her upward toward a climax that hovered just out of her reach.
In Florida, Gran and Grandad were trapped by a fallen tree, calling for her, calling while she was in bed with the man of her dreams.
I love you, Alana. Stay with me. I can’t live without—
Alana woke up, breathless with panic, wildly aroused…and alone.
“Oh my God.” She rose to her elbows, pushed her damp hair back from her face. Or more appropriately, “Oh, thank God.”
Just a dream. Sawyer wasn’t with her. Gran and Grandad were safe. Alana had time to get to them and make sure they stayed that way, though with her shaky and sick from not enough sleep, the drive loomed impossibly long and lonely ahead of her. A crazy undertaking.
Why had she dreamed Sawyer was in love with her?
More crazy. And crazier still to feel warm and blissful and cared-for and desirable when her dream thought he did.
She laughed to illustrate how gosh-darn wacky it was, but something in her heart refused to smirk along and the laughter never quite convinced her.
Did she mention crazy?
She dragged her eyes to the clock. Three-thirty. She’d planned to get up at four, might as well cut her losses and do it now.
Yawning, she stumbled to the bathroom, not thinking about Sawyer standing there hours earlier, not thinking about his warm body in the dream, not thinking about being unaccountably sad leaving him, not thinking about him, not thinking, not, not, not.
She showered, shivering from lack of sleep, towel-dried her hair, then threw the towel sleepily around her and went back out into the hallway.
“Hi.”
She couldn’t believe it. She absolutely could not believe it. Had he been listening for her? Had he somehow known he could find her damp and naked except for draped terry cloth? “What are you doing up?” she whispered.
“I couldn’t sleep. You?”
“I’m…me, neither.”
“So you thought a shower would help?”
Alana sighed. “I figured I’d just leave now.”
“Sneaking out, huh?” He took a step toward her as he had earlier, but this time darkness made the wide hallway seem even more intimate, and this time Alana doubted Melanie would burst out of her room to interrupt; she was a reliable and heavy sleeper.
So this time Alana had to deal with him all by herself, and rely on her common sense and her strength and—
“Mmm, you smell good.”
“Um. Well.” She backed up. “Strawberry shampoo. Could you not stand so close?”
“Why?” He was barely making tone, but the silence in the house was so profound his voice traveled easily.
“Because…you’re too close.” She edged toward her room, hugging the wall at her back.
He followed. “Too close for what?”
Too close for sanity. “For rules of personal space.”
“Answer this for me, Alana.”
She frowned, not liking the note of intimacy that had crept into his voice. “What?”
“Do I make you as insane as you make me?”
Her breathing hit a speed bump. “I have no idea. I don’t know how insane I make—”
“Completely…” He laid a finger on her bare shoulder, let it trail sensually down her arm.
No. He was not going to do this to her again. She was attracted to him, yes. So what. “Look, Sawyer, I’m on my way to Florida in about fifteen minutes, so there’s no point in starting anything.”
“We already started something. This is finishing. Or no, I don’t like the sound of that. How about starting phase two?”
“Uh…no.” To her delight, common sense gained ground against her dream and his magnetism. “My sister is nuts about you, you’re going on a date tomorrow with Debbie, the woman you tried to pick up a few nights ago, but gee, who cares about any of that, how about a quickie with Alana while she’s still here?”
“I never said anything about quick.” He laughed at her glare, but without much humor. “Well, Alana, I’ll say this, you sure know how to make a guy feel good.”
Perfect. She was on a roll. “Sawyer, I am attracted to you, and the other night was really and very weirdly amazing, but…what’s the point?”
“The point is that we can make each other feel good and I can distract you for a few extremely satisfying days until after the hurricane, because it’s a dangerous decision to go now, a decision which will put an unfair burden of worry on your grandparents who already have plenty to worry about just taking care of themselves, which it sounds like they can do just fine without you, not to mention an unfair burden of worry on Melanie and…” He stopped for a breath and his gaze intensified. “On me.”
She nearly growled. The last thing she wanted was for him to start making sense. “I need to be there.”
“You need. This is about you. You can’t stand your grandparents being there and you being here with danger approaching, because you love and want to protect them. I get that. I admire it. But putting yourself in the same danger isn’t going to help them. They’ve been responsible, they’ve taken care of everything.” His lips curved in a small smile. “They’ve even asked you not to make the trip so they don’t have to worry.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. He wasn’t supposed to be winning with common sense. How the hell was she supposed to think this through clearly standing naked in a towel with him so close? Right now, she was afraid he could tell her she was descended from a family of Irish tree frogs and she’d believe him. “So you’re going to distract me with sex?”
“I was planning to.” He put his hands on the wall on either side of her head; she felt trapped by his body and wasn’t sure she minded. “Until you graciously pointed out that I’m an unfeeling player who uses women indiscriminately to serve my body and my enormous ego. That what I feel for you is nothing special at all, that there isn’t some extraordinary pull between us that defies logic and explanation. Right? Isn’t that what you said?”
She had no idea what she’d said and less what to say now. He spoke in a low, even voice, but his words had the same impact as if he’d been shouting at her.
“Why are you so anxious to judge me badly? You take each shred of circumstantial evidence you can possibly use against me, then pump it up into an insurmountable character flaw.” He lowered his face an inch from hers; she forced herself to focus on his chin, except even that was sexy to her. “What are you so afraid of?”
“I’m not afraid.” Her hoarse whisper trembled. Her body followed suit. She was terrified, and she didn’t know why.
“Then don’t stop me. I dare you.” His mouth found hers in a slow, gentle kiss that reached her so deeply it terrified her more. She pulled away. “Don’t.”
“Shh.” He slid his hands up the wall, moved closer, kissed her forehead, her temple, her cheek. The only sound was her shallow breathing, catching with each touch of his lips.
She couldn’t move, caught in the grip of exactly opposing forces, half instructing her to respond, half instructing her to break free.
“I have no romantic feelings for Melanie.” He slid a warm hand under her hair, tipped her head back so she was forced to meet his dark eyes, serious under dark lashes, his features softened in the glow from the bathroom light which she’d been too startled to shut off. “I’m having coffee with Debbie tomorrow morning. Not exactly a hot date. After meeting you, I can barely remember what she looks like.”
Alana lowered her eyes. Too much intensity, too powerful, too much temptation to believe him, believe everything, then take it further until she was expecting to live the dream she just had and believe he loved her. “Stop doing this.”
“What, being right? Being sensible? Being made insane by you?”
“Yes.”
He grinned. “I want you safe, Alana. And to prove that I’m not just out to get laid, I promise you that I will stay completely brotherly the rest of your time here, if that’s a day, a week, a month or forever. Okay?”
She nodded dazedly, already feeling a sharp loss. “Okay.”
“Good.” He pushed away from the wall. “We have a deal. You stay until Cynthia’s passed, and I act the perfect gentleman.”
“Yes. Okay.” She’d stay, not only because he asked her to, or bullied her into it, but because on some level she knew taking the trip now was madness. On some level she was grateful he reined in her blind obsession to do her duty and got her to acknowledge the right choice.
“Just one thing.” He leaned in again.
She shrank back. “Oh, no.”
“I’ll keep my promise.” A slow, wicked grin lit his face and melted a part of her she needed to stay solid and strong if she was going to make it intact through the next few days. “But there’s nothing stopping you from inviting me to do whatever you want, however you want, whenever you want it.”